"There is no greatness where simplicity, goodness and truth
are absent."
Leo Tolstoy

Friday, April 04, 2014

The Oil Barons Are In Charge

The conventional wisdom, Linda McQuaig writes, is that ordinary people don't understand the science of climate change:

It’s we ordinary people, with our self-absorption or resistance to
change, who are the prime culprits in the world’s failure to act against
climate disaster.

But that's backwards:

By focusing on the alleged failure of ordinary people to tackle climate
change, we take our eyes off the real culprits behind the drapes — the
fossil fuel industry and lickspittle governments, the best example being
the one in Ottawa.

Big Fossil is the wealthiest and most powerful lobby in world history.
Any serious attempt to tackle climate change would involve it giving up
future profits that are truly staggering.

There was a time when Canada had a finger on the pulse of the petrochemical industry. This was through the National Energy Program (NEP)and the purchase of Phillips Petroleum to create Petro Canada. Where Trudeau went wrong was by trying to be too big and overpaying for Petro Fina.

We all know that Mulroney and his ilk quickly undermined the benefit of Petro Canada, by giving it away. Now we have the worst government in Canadian history aided by Harper toadies giving the public purse to Big Oil. When I say giving, I mean not charging adequate royalties, providing grants to the industry and not even minisculey dealing with the environmental degradation.

We all know it is the bottomless pits of greed corporations, that call all of the shots.

Harper has been sneakily working on the TPP which, is another corporate give-a-way. This gives greedy corporations, a hell of a lot more power. When corporations line up at the trough and squeal for more money? Harper gives them, another $60 billion in tax reductions.

Corporations demand cheap labor. Harper has brought over foreign workers, for the corporations to exploit.

Corporations are pushing for the NAU. This has been on the books for years. However, people will sleep through that too. The 3 Amigo's just had another meeting.

Kerry signals advance, of NAU Plan.01/28/2014www.wind.com

The end of Canada's sovereignty, as a Nation State and security perimeter.07/19/2012www.globalresearch.ca

Has anyone even read? Harper gives a speech in New York at, the Council of Foreign Relations. This was Sept 25/2007. Harper fully endorsed the NAU. Harper is the front man for the NAU.

That is why Harper is using every dirty tactic in the book, to cheat this next election too. Harper is rabid for power and glory. And, people just don't see this. If we don't get rid of Harper, like yesterday this country will be lost to us.

""What we are suffering from today as the greatest sustainability challenge is not poverty, it is not greed, it is not climate change, it is not declining fisheries … or forests or biodiversity. None of those things, though they are very, very important. What we are suffering from today is the lack of competence in our leadership…— Dr. Karl-Henrik Robèrt, Founder of The Natural Step." -found here:

http://qualicuminstitute.ca/

In Canada the blame falls on Stephen Harper's shoulders and he just dismisses the fact that he is not a leader, he is but only in name. A fourteen year old may well do a better job.

Its interesting to note that Bill McKibben former New Yorker Magazine journalist who has written books on climate change and is an American environmental activist/organizer who is opposed to the Harper Trans Canada Pipelines Keystone XL pipeline from Alberta to the Texas gulf coast knows Harpers government better than Harper supporters. He is quoted as saying "The Harper government is a wholly owned subsidiary of the fossil fuel industry." -From article in print; End of the Line, MacLean's February 3, 2014 p. 36. It used to be Canadians knew more about Canada and the US then their American counterparts, now the tables seem to have turned.

In the same article it states that in October 2012 the Canadian government planned a $24 billion dollar international campaign to promote the oil/tar sands. This is of course what a subsidiary is supposed to do, protect and serve the mother company. Its kind of nice when you are a multi-billion dollar oil corporation that you don't have to sell your product, which is a hard sell due to the copious amounts of carbon released into the atmosphere just to get raw heavy crude out of the ground before it hits a tanker or a pipeline. Just the tar sands alone apart from the rest of Canada released more CO2 into the atmosphere than 153* countries worldwide in 2010.

In 2010 the oil sands project released approximately 48,000,000** tonnes of GHG's into the atmosphere, which was only exceeded by 64* countries in the world. Oil sands produced more GHG's than the bottom 73 countries combined total representing 30%* of the worlds countries. Of GHG's emitted by country the oil sands are flanked above by # 64 Hungary @ 50,600,000 tonnes* and the if oil sands were a country it would be # 65 @ 48,000,000 tonnes** followed by Denmark below (# 65, which would be) # 66 @ 46,300,000* tonnes. By 2020 the oil sands are expected to release 104,000,000 tonnes**, which is the same as Uzbekistan # 39 in 2010.*

Here is my contribution to Harper's re-election supporters based on not just McKibben's observation:

"Your vote for the Great Holy Gas Conservative Party of Canada and the Hot Air Harper Government is greatly appreciated by your local oil company billionaire - The Canadian Government keeps on giving and giving and giving thanks to you."

Harper in the long run, by harnessing "his" government policy to 'ezra'cal oil produced in the oil sands, may in the end tar and feather himself as it can be righteously stated, as McKibben has, that big oil has in fact taken over the Harper government in a coup d'etat for its own nefarious purposes. It was not sudden it was stealthy, it was violent to certain aspects of Canadian's lives and it is indeed an illegal seizure of power from government, with Harper and his equivocating con crew being complicit as in treasonous. So this can be rightfully called a coup. Some day the flock will come home to roost and the complete con crew will have to face the music.

OTTAWA — More than two-thirds of all oil sands production in Canada is owned by foreign entities, sending a majority of the industry’s profits out of the country, says a new analysis released Thursday by a British Columbia-based conservation group. The research by Forest EthicsAdvocacy was based on an analysis of shareholder information in January 2012 from Bloomberg Professional of more than a dozen companies, including nine with headquarters in Canada, and six with their head offices in other countries. It found 71% of the ownership of oilsands production was foreign...

Canada buys high and sells low when it comes to crude oil, costing the world’s 10th largest economy billions in lost revenue as it expands production from one of the world’s largest energy deposits. The gap between Alberta’s exported Western Canada Select and Brent oil imported into Ontario and Quebec was about $30.50 a barrel yesterday, and that difference is creating a drag on growth according to Bank of Canada Governor Mark Carney. Annual losses of about $19-billion may persist...

Harper is such a great economic manager when it comes to oil and energy. Instead of forcing a pipeline across the US border, which is an international struggle or ramming one through the environmentally sensitive forests, mountains, rivers, lakes and muskeg of BC it makes way more economic sense to refine the raw product at home in Alberta and then satisfy all of Canada's needs first. The money and profit is in the refined product; gasoline, aviation fuel, diesel fuel, motor oil and all the other products of refined petroleum not so much in the raw crude. Harper's actions are that of a colonial era colonizer making Canada a petro colony where we export raw materials (crude) and import refined or finished goods (oil). It has never worked favourably when it comes to extraction and exportation of natural resources for the donor country. It will not work in favour of Harper's Canada today either, but it sure will benefit the recipients of our raw crude. Harper is creating a boom that will end in bust he is peddling short term gains for long term pains. Today long term economic plans that do not embrace sustainability are environmental suicide pacts and therefore economic policy based on non-renewable resources is the instigator of such pacts.

About Me

A retired English teacher, I now write about public policy and, occasionally, personal experience. I leave it to the reader to determine if I practice what I preached to my students for thirty-two years.